Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager

 

Tapping Your Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager's Inner Motivation

This article addresses some practical concerns raised by parents in response to my suggestion that praising too much is actually counter-productive while trying to motivate our Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren. "But if I stop giving my Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren praise and rewards they won’t be motivated to do anything!"

parenting advice, discipline, motivating your Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager, intrinsic motivation, punished by rewards, external validation, self-esteem

This article addresses some practical questions raised by parents in response to my suggestion that praising too much is actually counter-productive while trying to motivate our Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren.

<b>~~ But if I’m not praising and not punishing, what do I do instead? ~~</b>

Try simply communicating your sincere admiration, gratitude, and appreciation when it arises. When your Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager does something admirable, let him know how you feel. “Wow! Do I count 20 towers on that sand castle?!” instead of “Good building, Johnny!” The difference is that when you admire or appreciate, you join him in his experience and there’s an alignment. When you praise, you derail his train and bring it over to your track.

When you are grateful for your Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager’s help, say so. When she shares a little known fact that she learned at school, your interest and attention are the reward. Becoming a valued and contributing member of the family and society is much more of a reinforcement than grades or a gold stars.

Try treating your Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager like you’d treat an adult neighbor or coworker. I don’t see my neighbors getting smiley stickers when they shovel their driveway or weed their garden, even if they do a really good job. And no one says, “Good gardening, Joe!”

Nonetheless, a well-maintained yard is a pleasure for the whole neighborhood, and I can let them know that I enjoy the fruits of their labors without praising them. A quiet and sincere comment of acknowledgment and appreciation goes a long way.

The difference lies in the intention. Kids recognize from a mile away that praise is really a sugarcoated agenda. Most of them prefer and respond positively to sincerity. Wouldn’t you?

<b>~~But if I stop giving rewards they won’t be motivated to do anything! ~~</b>

We each do dozens of things every day for no external reward. We sew or knit or paint or do woodworking just for fun. We strive to decrease our time or improve our score just for the thrill of growth and mastery. We wash dishes so we can eat from clean plates later. We stop at red lights even when there are no police cars in sight, because we want to arrive at our destination in one piece.

Babies learn to walk because their developing bodies drive them to do so, not because we clap and cheer at their first steps! It really is ok to leave them alone with their process. I’m not saying we can’t share in their delight. But they learn to walk even without any gold stars.

Doesn’t this make you wonder how many other accomplishments might be motivated by a similar internal drive if given the chance? Wouldn’t it be great to just relax and trust this intrinsic impulse?

If this subject intrigues you, be sure to check out the book <b>Punished by Rewards</b> by Alfie Kohn. It’s a fascinating read!

copyright karen alonge 2006

 

The Narcissist as Eternal Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager

"Puer Aeternus" – the eternal adolescent, the semipternal Peter pan – is a phenomenon often associated with pathological narcissism. People who refuse to grow up strike others as self-centred and aloof, petulant and brattish, haughty and demanding – in short: as Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerish or infantile.

"Puer Aeternus" – the eternal adolescent, the semipternal Peter pan – is a phenomenon often associated with pathological narcissism. People who refuse to grow up strike others as self-centred and aloof, petulant and brattish, haughty and demanding – in short: as Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerish or infantile.

The narcissist is a partial adult. He seeks to avoid adulthood. Infantilisation – the discrepancy between one's advanced chronological age and one's retarded behaviour, cognition, and emotional development – is the narcissist's preferred art form. Some narcissists even use a Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerish tone of voice occasionally and adopt a toddler's body language.

But most narcissist resort to more subtle means.

They reject or avoid adult chores and functions. They refrain from acquiring adult skills (such as driving) or an adult's formal education. They evade adult responsibilities towards others, including and especially towards their nearest and dearest. They hold no steady jobs, never get married, raise no family, cultivate no roots, maintain no real friendships or meaningful relationships.

Many a narcissist remains attached to his (or her) family of origin. By clinging to his parents, the narcissist continues to act in the role of a Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager. He thus avoids the need to make adult decisions and (potentially painful) choices. He transfers all adult chores and responsibilities – from laundry to baby-sitting – to his parents, siblings, spouse, or other relatives. He feels unshackled, a free spirit, ready to take on the world (in other words omnipotent and omnipresent).

Such "delayed adulthood" is very common in many poor and developing countries, especially those with patriarchal societies. I wrote in "The Last Family":

"To the alienated and schizoid ears of Westerners, the survival of family and community in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) sounds like an attractive proposition. A dual purpose safety net, both emotional and economic, the family in countries in transition provides its members with unemployment benefits, accommodation, food and psychological advice to boot.

Divorced daughters, saddled with little (and not so little) ones, the prodigal sons incapable of finding a job befitting their qualifications, the sick, the unhappy – all are absorbed by the compassionate bosom of the family and, by extension the community. The family, the neighbourhood, the community, the village, the tribe – are units of subversion as well as useful safety valves, releasing and regulating the pressures of contemporary life in the modern, materialistic, crime ridden state.

The ancient blood feud laws of the kanoon were handed over through familial lineages in northern Albania, in defiance of the paranoiac Enver Hoxha regime. Criminals hide among their kin in the Balkans, thus effectively evading the long arm of the law (state). Jobs are granted, contracts signed and tenders won on an open and strict nepotistic basis and no one finds it odd or wrong. There is something atavistically heart-warming in all this.

Historically, the rural units of socialisation and social organisation were the family and the village. As villagers migrated to the cities, these structural and functional patterns were imported by them, en masse. The shortage of urban apartments and the communist invention of the communal apartment (its tiny rooms allocated one per family with kitchen and bathroom common to all) only served to perpetuate these ancient modes of multi-generational huddling. At best, the few available apartments were shared by three generations: parents, married off-spring and their Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren. In many cases, the living space was also shared by sickly or no-good relatives and even by unrelated families.

These living arrangements – more adapted to rustic open spaces than to high rises – led to severe social and psychological dysfunctions. To this very day, Balkan males are spoiled by the subservience and servitude of their in-house parents and incessantly and compulsively catered to by their submissive wives. Occupying someone else's home, they are not well acquainted with adult responsibilities.

Stunted growth and stagnant immaturity are the hallmarks of an entire generation, stifled by the ominous proximity of suffocating, invasive love. Unable to lead a healthy sex life behind paper thin walls, unable to raise their Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren and as many Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren as they see fit, unable to develop emotionally under the anxiously watchful eye of their parents – this greenhouse generation is doomed to a zombie-like existence in the twilight nether land of their parents' caves. Many ever more eagerly await the demise of their caring captors and the promised land of their inherited apartments, free of their parents' presence.

The daily pressures and exigencies of co-existence are enormous. The prying, the gossip, the criticism, the chastising, the small agitating mannerisms, the smells, the incompatible personal habits and preferences, the pusillanimous bookkeeping – all serve to erode the individual and to reduce him or her to the most primitive mode of survival. This is further exacerbated by the need to share expenses, to allocate labour and tasks, to plan ahead for contingencies, to see off threats, to hide information, to pretend and to fend off emotionally injurious behaviour. It is a sweltering tropic of affective cancer."

Alternatively, by acting as surrogate caregiver to his siblings or parents, the narcissist displaces his adulthood into a fuzzier and less demanding territory. The social expectations from a husband and a father are clear-cut. Not so from a substitute, mock, or ersatz parent. By investing his efforts, resources, and emotions in his family of origin, the narcissist avoids having to establish a new family and face the world as an adult. His is an "adulthood by proxy", a vicarious imitation of the real thing.

The ultimate in dodging adulthood is finding God (long recognised as a father-substitute), or some other "higher cause". The believer allows the doctrine and the social institutions that enforce it to make decisions for him and thus relieve him of responsibility. He succumbs to the paternal power of the collective and surrenders his personal autonomy. In other words, he is a Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager once more. Hence the allure of faith and the lure of dogmas such as nationalism or Communism or liberal democracy.

But why does the narcissist refuse to grow up? Why does he postpone the inevitable and regards adulthood as a painful experience to be avoided at a great cost to personal growth and self-realisation? Because remaining essentially a toddler caters to all his narcissistic needs and defences and nicely tallies with the narcissist's inner psychodynamic landscape.

Pathological narcissism is an infantile defence against abuse and trauma, usually occurring in early Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerhood or early adolescence. Thus, narcissism is inextricably entwined with the abused Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager's or adolescent's emotional make-up, cognitive deficits, and worldview. To say "narcissist" is to say "thwarted, tortured Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager".

It is important to remember that overweening, smothering, spoiling, overvaluing, and idolising the Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager – are all forms of parental abuse. There is nothing more narcissistically-gratifying than the admiration and adulation (Narcissistic Supply) garnered by precocious Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager-prodigies (Wunderkinder). Narcissists who are the sad outcomes of excessive pampering and sheltering become addicted to it.

In a paper published in Quadrant in 1980 and titled "Puer Aeternus: The Narcissistic Relation to the Self", Jeffrey Satinover, a Jungian analyst, offers these astute observations:

"The individual narcissistically bound to (the image or archetype of the divine Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager) for identity can experience satisfaction from a concrete achievement only if it matches the grandeur of this archetypal image. It must have the qualities of greatness, absolute uniqueness, of being the best and … prodigiously precocious. This latter quality explains the enormous fascination of Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager prodigies, and also explains why even a great success yields no permanent satisfaction for the puer: being an adult, no accomplishment is precocious unless he stays artificially young or equates his accomplishments with those of old age (hence the premature striving after the wisdom of those who are much older)."

The simple truth is that Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren get away with narcissistic traits and behaviours. Narcissists know that. They envy Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren, hate them, try to emulate them and, thus, compete with them for scarce Narcissistic Supply.

Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren are forgiven for feeling grandiose and self-important or even encouraged to develop such emotions as part of "building up their self-esteem". Kids frequently exaggerate with impunity accomplishments, talents, skills, contacts, and personality traits – exactly the kind of conduct that narcissists are chastised for!

As part of a normal and healthy development trajectory, young Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren are as obsessed as narcissists are with fantasies of unlimited success, fame, fearsome power or omnipotence, and unequalled brilliance. Adolescent are expected to be preoccupied with bodily beauty or sexual performance (as is the somatic narcissist), or ideal, everlasting, all-conquering love or passion. What is normal in the first 16 years of life is labelled a pathology later on.

Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren are firmly convinced that they are unique and, being special, can only be understood by, should only be treated by, or associate with, other special or unique, or high-status people. In time, through the process of socialisation, young adults learn the benefits of collaboration and acknowledge the innate value of each and every person. Narcissists never do. They remain fixated in the earlier stage.

Preteens and teenagers require excessive admiration, adulation, attention and affirmation. It is a transient phase that gives place to the self-regulation of one's sense of inner worth. Narcissists, however, remain dependent on others for their self-esteem and self-confidence. They are fragile and fragmented and thus very susceptible to criticism, even if it is merely implied or imagined.

Well into pubescence, Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren feel entitled. As toddlers, they demand automatic and full compliance with their unreasonable expectations for special and favourable priority treatment. They grow out of it as they develop empathy and respect for the boundaries, needs, and wishes of other people. Again, narcissists never mature, in this sense.

Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren, like adult narcissists, are "interpersonally exploitative", i.e., use others to achieve their own ends. During the formative years (0-6 years old), Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren are devoid of empathy. They are unable to identify with, acknowledge, or accept the feelings, needs, preferences, priorities, and choices of others.

Both adult narcissists and young Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren are envious of others and sometimes seek to hurt or destroy the causes of their frustration. Both groups behave arrogantly and haughtily, feel superior, omnipotent, omniscient, invincible, immune, "above the law", and omnipresent (magical thinking), and rage when frustrated, contradicted, challenged, or confronted.

The narcissist seeks to legitimise his Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager-like conduct and his infantile mental world by actually remaining a Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenager, by refusing to mature and to grow up, by avoiding the hallmarks of adulthood, and by forcing others to accept him as the Puer Aeternus, the Eternal Youth, a worry-free, unbounded, Peter Pan.

 

The Pink Kit Method - a comprehensive, new and unique approach to Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth preparation, labour management and coaching skills for expectant parents

There are 4 foundations to The Pink Kit Method for birthing body™. The 1st foundation has been put into the multi-media resource called The Pink Kit: Essential Preparations for your birthing body. In the video and interactive book, expectant parents will learn the body knowledge that makes such common sense you’ll wonder why you haven’t known it before. We can map our pelvis and know our own shape. That shape helps us find positions that keep us open rather than assume that certain positions are better than others. We can create inner relaxation with the pelvic clock and create more space for our baby with the hip lift, sacral manoeuvre and sit bone spread. We can use a type of directed breathing that we can use to focus our attention, expand or relax specific areas of our body.

birthing, human behaviours, baby, parents, Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth, pain, labour, breathing, exercise, hospital, doctor, medical

There are 4 foundations to The Pink Kit Method for birthing body™. The 1st foundation has been put into the multi-media resource called The Pink Kit: Essential Preparations for your birthing body. In the video and interactive book, expectant parents will learn the body knowledge that makes such common sense you’ll wonder why you haven’t known it before. We can map our pelvis and know our own shape. That shape helps us find positions that keep us open rather than assume that certain positions are better than others. We can create inner relaxation with the pelvic clock and create more space for our baby with the hip lift, sacral manoeuvre and sit bone spread. We can use a type of directed breathing that we can use to focus our attention, expand or relax specific areas of our body.

Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth is a simple plumbing exercise. An object has to come through and out of a container. To do that it must pass through a tube (pelvis), open a diaphragm (cervix) and aperture (vagina). The object likes space, room and not to have its passage bent.

In the multi-media kit is located the 2nd foundation of The Pink Kit Method on an audio tape called The Internal Work. This is the vital internal work or how to prepare your birth canal … the aperture. The plumbing concept of birth seems easy yet some things get in the way. We are the container. We bring to Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth our structure, our ability to relax or tense up and accept the process of Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth which can be very painful or fight against it. The goal of The Pink Kit Method is for each of us to create mobility and flexibility in our structure and learn to relax even when the sensations are very painful. Fortunately we can use our incredible human mind and make choices about our behaviours when we have the skills based on our preparation. We can only make realistic choices in our behaviours when we have the knowledge. The Pink Kit is the knowledge. Preparing our birth canal:

· Creates a soft aperture for our baby to come through.
· Teaches us to respond to the sensations in 2nd stage rather than react. (Feeling we will have a bowel motion, the stinging sensations of the stretching can cause women to pull back from the down urge.)
· Prevents trauma to the soft tissue of our vagina.

An adjunctive resource was developed to step you through The Pink Kit video called Companion Guide. Although the sections in the video are easy to follow, many people wanted written instructions as well. This resource also introduces 3 new exercises: Kate’s Cat, Thai Massage, Letting Down Reflex along with two new concepts: Common language which develops good communication with your partner/husband and the concept that there are defined skills for the Birth and Coach Role. These concepts are expanded in the 4th foundation New Focus: Breath, Language and Touch.

Primarily the stories we told about Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth were about the physical experience we had. We spoke about pain, or lack of it. We had back labours, failure to dilate, babies that stayed high in the pelvis, vaginas that tore, were cut or didn’t open easily or ones that opened in one contraction. We had quick, very intense births and painless ones. We had long, lingering labours that didn’t seem to get started and when they did we were dog tired. Story after story told of us that birth is primarily a physical experience. Some of those experiences were absolutely wonderful. Many women do just ‘get labour’. Realistically, many women don’t get labour. The use of medical pain relief is an attempt to prevent women from suffering too much pain in the process of Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth. If women were really ‘getting labour’ they won’t be using pain relief.

In our stories, we spoke about residual pain or lack of it. Residual pain often lasted for months or years and often laid a foundation to an unsettled early parenting period. We couldn’t sit down, move our bowels, had burning when we urinated, pain on sex, vaginal wind, infections from tears or incisions, along with pain in our pubic bone or tail bone. Some women breezed through labour and the recovery. The Pink Kit Method just makes it possible for more women to do that. Maybe we won’t all breeze through it, but we’ll work better with the process in a conscious manner with the skills we’ve taught ourselves through our preparation. The first two foundations of The Pink Kit Method deal with some of these physical issues because we are now able to create a mobile birthing body and learn how to relax inside and prepare our birth canal.

The 3rd foundation of The Pink Kit Method is the Managing Skills. We all acknowledge that Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth is a huge event in our lives and our Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren. We also know that most of us have never been to a birth and don’t have a clue what happens much less what to do, how to act or behave. The Managing Skills give us more subjective yet vitally important skills. Do you know that women who niggle for several days are more likely to get tired before progressive labour establishes if they don’t have good coping skills? We can prevent that by asking a simple question ‘What do you want to do now?’ and learning how to calm our mind and understand this early, kind phase of Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenageribirth. Are you aware that while in labour it’s vitally important to stay in the NOW and apply good management skills at each and every moment throughout your labour? We don’t have to wait until the pain of labour is threatening our self control. Instead we can stay on top of the sensations when we apply our skills. Can you imagine working with your husband, partner, relative or friend really well? We can learn to form a good team between ourselves and the person or people who are their to support us.

Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth is a whole picture, not just another contraction. We can learn these subjective skills that work to integrate our Pink Kit preparation into our own experience. Of course, there’s a section on when to use The Pink Kit skills you’ve taught yourself. Our stories also told of our own self management experience in and around what was happening to us or around us. In other words, there were as many women who felt good about how they had managed labour in hospital with all the assessments, monitoring and procedure and health issues as there were women who didn’t feel good about how they had managed their labour even though they had accomplished a home birth.

Because our stories are so varied, the goal of The Pink Kit Method has always been passing on the labour management skills that work well in absolutely all birth situations so that each of us can come away from our birth feeling positive about our self management and how well our husband/partner coached us. Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth is too full of variables or the unexpected to know what it will be like; however, we can have skills to work through the process as it unfolds. We can have skills that are adaptable and transportable into any birth situation. No woman should deprive herself of positive labour management skills regardless of her choices or the necessity in regards to maternity care or management. In other words, Common Knowledge Trust bypasses the ‘either versus or’ approach to Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth that has become familiar to so many of us. EITHER we will birth in hospital with a doctor and have a medical birth OR we will birth at home with a midwife and have a natural birth.

As we self managed labour, most of us felt that we had a natural birth even when there was a great deal of medical care. We felt that way because we felt good about how we had coped, managed and responded to our own internal process of dilating and giving birth. Many birth professionals admired our management and loved that our husbands/partners were such good coaches. They wished more couples could have such an experience. They often felt we had had ‘lucky’ or ‘easy’ births because they so strongly felt that Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth is so unknown there is nothing we can do to prepare for birth. We knew we had prepared for birth and then used our good management and coaching skills to work through the unknown journey as it evolved. We had conscious births.

We not only explored our own management of labour, we also looked at the three most primal behaviours that accompanied Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth. They are so much part of Life that we hardly notice them. However, the unique qualities of Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth require unique applications of these ordinary human behaviours.

The 4th foundation of The Pink Kit Method is New Focus: Breath, Language and Touch. We will all breathe in labour, communicate with our husband/partner and be physically touched (or not). These are human behaviours that all of us share. Within these three shared behaviours there are positive ways we can use them in labour. In the 1970s when fathers came to help us, Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth education classes focused on breathing and relaxation techniques. As birth discussions focused more on ‘choice’ (birth plans) and ‘information’ (informed consent), the skills were less stressed. In fact, a new belief around Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth grew. This belief told women that they breathed all the time and would breathe in labour so there was nothing they needed to know. Natural birth has incorporated many beliefs that have actually acted to deskill women. It’s almost as though it’s become admirable to believe the ideal birth is ‘intuitive’ and ‘instinctive’ and requires little knowledge which might interfere with the process. The stories that created The Pink Kit Method approaches clearly show us that when we have positive birth skills, we respond to the process of Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth with a consciousness unparalleled.

Unlike our traditional counterparts who are surrounded by people closest to us who will help us each step of the way through Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth, we are often left alone either in hospital (checked periodically) or a home by midwives who are giving us the space to discover our own process. Either way, we can take our amazing Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth and coaching skills with us. When we do this, our births become a conscious highlight in our lives. Through our self learned skills we brought attunement to the birth of our Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerren.

New Focus: BLT is split into the Birth and Coach role. We have different jobs do to in labour and giving birth yet we can use the same knowledge to do those jobs well. When we work together in labour, we develop close bonds with our husband, partner, friends or relatives. It’s far better to bond with those close to us than our birth provider no matter how wonderful. As a labouring woman, we are required to look within ourselves. When we coach our partner, we are looking at how she is responding to the process from within herself. When we both use The Pink Kit Method, then we stay on the same track.

In the Breath section, we learn that there are only 4 ways humans breathe. Two are positive breath behaviours in Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth and two indicate that a woman isn’t coping well with the sensations. From the birth role, we can learn how to use breath as a focus, expand areas or relax specific areas of our body. From the coach role, we can learn how to hear whether a woman is managing the sensations, how to model good breathing behaviour to help her stay on track and how to help her expand and relax specific areas.

In the Language section, we can learn the specific language that really helps women to relax. We often use general language such as ‘relax’ when we see tension in a labouring woman. She is most likely to turn to you and snarl. ‘you try’, ‘I’m trying’ or ‘shut up’. Instead we can specifically tell her to ‘soften in your lower back’. This gives her the place and action and she’ll to do it. She’s momentarily forgotten or not observed that specific tension because the sensations at the moment are BIG. In this section we can learn that verbal messages take a wee bit of time to go in the ear, through the brain, to the body and back to the brain. So you learn about the importance of pausing.

Language or communication can be non-verbal as well. In labour the ability to give each other cues to convey information is important. Particularly in the rigorous part of labour, women short form communication.

In the Touch section of New Focus you learn the type of touch that produces deep internal relaxation. This form of deep, rising touch allows all the connective tissue (fascia) to relax. Most people don’t realize the importance of fascia and how much tense can be stored there. Most people think of tension being caused by muscles. Try this so you can understand the difference between muscles (which is part of soft tissue or connective tissue) and fascia (which is also part of soft/connective tissue and what we need to relax in labour along with specific muscles).

Sit or stand and look straight ahead. Relax your head, neck and shoulders yet still keep your head facing forward. Put your index finger on your forehead about an inch above the outer edge of your eyebrow. Remember keep your head facing forward no matter what. Start to apply pressure to turn your head and continue to increase that pressure. Hopefully, you’ll notice that it takes very little effort to keep your head facing forward even when you apply a great deal of pressure to turn your head.

In labour, that simple fixed or frozen soft tissue (inside of the container) can stop mobility, openness and space. Babies need space to move through you. Couple that fixed or frozen fascia with tensing up your muscles, then you can imagine why the object might have a struggle to get out of the container. Go back to your exercise above and add muscle tension. Our coach can see muscle tension but not see connective tissue tension. Both the Birth and Coach role need to work to reduce that tension, particularly when it’s inside.

When we combine all these Pink Kit skills, this common sense and self knowledge we gain then we can approach Child, Juvenile, Kiddic, Minor & Teenagerbirth with confidence in our ability to move through the process of giving birth. We don’t have to like one moment of it. Often our own greatest personal achievements are the accomplishments we have during challenging experiences.